


Come Pick Me Up?

by actually18pigeons



Series: Whumptober 2020 [6]
Category: White Collar
Genre: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Hurt Neal Caffrey, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Drug Use, Non-Consensual Drug Use, Whump, Whumptober, Whumptober 2020, drugged, no.22
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-10-07
Updated: 2020-10-07
Packaged: 2021-03-08 03:02:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,179
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26868601
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/actually18pigeons/pseuds/actually18pigeons
Summary: This is episode tag 5xo4 where Neal is drugged by the psychiatrist. This picks up after he leaves her office bc the fact that he magically made his way back to Peter after being drugged is a little sus.
Series: Whumptober 2020 [6]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1941847
Comments: 3
Kudos: 68





	Come Pick Me Up?

**Author's Note:**

> Whumptober Day 6, Prompt 22, Drugged. I was gonna publish a Hawaii Five-0 work I'm writing but it wasn't quite as good as I wanted it to be for publishing. So here's this. Sorry, it stops at a weird point. I'll continue this one soon.
> 
> Edited 2/17/21, no content changes just a whole lot of grammar stuff? Sorry about that.

Neal came to quickly, the smelling salts yanking him into the present, anxiety flooding his system as he took in the unfamiliar surrounding, and an unknown woman standing above him. 

Then the details started to resurface, Dr. Summers, the case, the fake appointment, the questions… did he answer them? 

“What happened?” His brain seemed to be processing all this information at half speed, trying to make sense of what had happened. He was no stranger to blacking out, but at least when he drank he was at his apartment alone and knew where he’d wake up. 

“We began to practice hypnotherapy technique, you were out for quite some time. You had trouble waking.”

Her voice was calming but something felt off. Something was wrong, something about her body language, the tone of voice, something. But he couldn’t quite grasp it. He felt hungover, mind still lagging, and body strangely numb. 

“I should go,” Neal stood from the chair, glad that his body responded semi-regularly. 

“Would you like me to call you a cab?”

“No, no, I’m fine.” If Neal knew one thing it was that he wasn’t fine, but that voice in his head was screaming for him to get out, get to Peter, then figure this out. 

As he walked through the lobby to the street the room started spinning. He caught himself on a chair, and stumbled out of the door, lowering himself to the concrete as his breath caught in his chest. Something was definitely wrong. 

Neal pulled his phone out, hands shaking as he mindlessly dialed Peter’s number. At least he could rely on muscle memory. 

Neal tugged on his hair as the phone rang, trying to ground himself, feeling the concrete below him, the brick behind him, hearing the blaring traffic and background noise of the city. 

“This is Peter.” Neal sighed in relief at the familiar voice. 

“Hey Peter,” it was like his mind couldn’t decide if he should be scared or play it cool, so his reply came out as a strangled, semi whispered greeting. 

“Neal, where are you? It’s been hours, you didn’t check-in, I’m getting hounded for progress on this case, so tell me you’ve got something.”

Neal swallowed, tangling his free hand tighter into his hair and pulling, his anxiety started to mount again, “Peter, something happened and I don’t know what, and I think Dr. Summers did something-”

“Neal slow down, where are you?”

“I’m outside of Dr. Summers’ office, Peter… something bad happened,” he tried to elaborate, tried to piece together the puzzle of the last several hours, anything before waking up in her office, but nothing was coming. Neal could distantly hear Peter shuffling on the other end of the call, Peter shouted something Neal couldn’t understand so he just hoped it wasn’t meant for him. 

Neal thought about standing up, just taking steps towards the street to hail a cab, but his legs wouldn't cooperate, nausea was starting to rise in his chest, and he couldn’t breathe, couldn’t talk he couldn’t- 

He reached up scratching at his neck, at the too-tight necktie, pulling it desperately trying to inhale. 

Peter could hear the shaky rasps on other end of the call, he spoke loudly and clearly “Neal I’m on my way to pick you up. Stay where you are I’ll be there in a few minutes.” Neal rested his head onto his knees chest loosening slightly, phone still pushed up against his ear. Peter hadn’t ended the call, and Neal was thankful to hear him narrating his every move, telling Neal as he climbed into his car. Anything to remind him that help was coming, Peter was coming. 

Nobody approached him on the street, that was one of the perks of New York City, the anonymity, or maybe it was concerning that nobody thought anything of seeing a man curled in on himself on the sidewalk. Neal could distantly hear a car starting, hoping that it was Peter on the phone instead of some car down the street, but his ears were ringing as his breaths came in gasps. His vision was swimming, it felt like all his senses were trying to kill him. Neal wanted to curl up tighter, cover his ears and scream. Anything to take control of the situation, but even that felt like too much effort, so he settled for covering one ear, the other pressed up against the phone, he picked his head up slightly, letting it fall back onto his knees with a thump, to try to get any kind of stimulation that didn’t make him feel like he was dying. He repeated this motion, dropping his head harder, gasping breaths catching up with him as black spots started to appear at the edges of his already blurry vision. 

Had he been drugged? Or was this a response to the hypnotherapy? But why couldn’t he remember anything that had happened during the appointment? These and a million different anxieties swirled through his head for an indeterminable amount of time, until he felt a sudden tap on his leg. 

Lifting his head up slightly he saw an all too common sight, Peter’s worried face. Peter’s hands gently skimmed over Neal’s body trying to assess some damage that must be there. He had never seen Neal so out of it, so scared, not since Kate’s death. Finding no obvious physical damage his hands reached to grasp Neal’s face gently, forcing him to look up, to stop trying to curl in on himself. 

“Neal what happened, what hurts?” 

Neal inhaled wetly, eyes damp but tears refusing to fall. “I don’t know Peter, I really don’t-I don’t know what’s wrong.”

“Okay, that’s alright Neal, can you stand? We can go back to the bureau and get a drug profile and check you over. Does that sound alright?” Peter’s heart seized at the thought that he had endangered Neal. He had left him defenseless with a woman that he knew was a suspect. And she had hurt him. 

Neal nodded slightly, reaching a hand out to Peter as Peter stood. Gasping his arm Peter pulled Neal up, steadying him as his knees locked and he faltered, listing to the side. Peter wrapped his arm around Neal’s waist, pulling Neal’s arm over his shoulders, steadying him.

Peter couldn’t tell if Neal had been drugged or if something had just severely upset him. But either way, something was definitely wrong. He pulled Neal towards the street where his car was still running. He lowered Neal into the passenger seat, pulling his seatbelt on when Neal made no move to do it himself. 

Neal remained silent as they drove the short drive back to the bureau, his breath still coming in shallow gasps and fidgeting with his fingers, but he looked a bit calmer than he had when Peter first saw him. 

When they arrived Neal unbuckled himself and Peter raced around to grab his arm for support as he exited the car. 

“You alright Neal?” Neal nodded, swallowing heavily as he swayed slightly. “Let’s get you inside.”


End file.
